25 | My Ridiculously Simple Healthy Gut Diet Plan (That You Can Actually Maintain!)

the long term ?

Well , listen , if you're saying yes to all of those questions , then that's exactly what we're going to be covering today , as I basically share not just what I eat to maintain good gut health , but how I eat as well and some other key strategies that I've refined over the past like 10 years or so of researching and experimenting to find what works best .

So welcome to the For Gut's Sake podcast . I'm your host , mark McClain , and this podcast is all about helping people reverse their IBS and ulcerative colitis . That's what I managed to do after a long journey a long , painful journey and we are all about sharing positive messages to help people take back control of their gut health In this podcast episode .

This is take number two , because I literally spent like two or three hours writing proper notes for this . I went through , I feel , like 40 minutes recording and then realized then I've turned the microphone on .

So that was a right pain in the arse , but right , but time to get back into it right now , before we dive into the meat of this episode , I've got a wee surprise for all the listeners . I've just finished writing a new ebook called Gut Rescue the five pillars to successfully reversing IBS and ulcerative colitis .

It's basically because I often get people asking me what I did to overcome my gut problems and it's not something that you can convey to somebody standing in the street for like five minutes or if someone sends me an email .

It's going to take quite a while to break down all the different things , the best things that I learned over the best part of eight years .

So what I've done is I've decided to create this ebook , pulling together all the best pieces of information and putting it in a really condensed , digestible way that people can go through and then they can find these key strategies that they can start implementing straight away .

So if you're interested in the ebook , you can download it via my website , which is wwwforgotsakeorg , but I'll also include a direct link in the episode description and the show notes below , just really to make life easy . Okay , let's begin straight away by saying that diet is subjective .

I honestly don't believe that there's a perfect diet out there that can just be applied to everyone . People's bodies react differently to all sorts of foods . For example , you might be able to eat a full packet of nuts , whereas your cousin might have a nut allergy that could kill him .

And then my neighbour might be able to drink milk every day no problem , whereas if I did that , I would start to feel bloated and sick as my body struggles with the lactose intolerance . And I know some people are really big fans of the carnivore diet these days .

They do really well on it , whereas I know other people who really rave about being vegan , and they tell us that that works best for them and their bodies . I'm not here to judge each to their own . There are all different ways that we find ways to be healthy and apply a diet to our own lives .

We're all unique individuals and today's episode is not about the best type of diet or giving you some sort of ultimate shopping list to solve all your gut health problems .

Instead , this episode is going to focus more on a lifestyle change and adopting a few nutritional principles which I believe help the vast majority of people with IBS , ulcerative colitis and some other digestive diseases .

I'm also going to give you four key pieces of advice for introducing positive dietary changes that are really easy to maintain , and these have delivered great results for me in improving my own digestive health .

So you've obviously seen that I've titled this episode my Simple , healthy Gut Diet Plan , but to be honest , I actually don't even like the words diet plan , because diets never work in the long run .

People who try all sorts of diets , either to lose weight or to try and improve their gut health they almost always fail , and this is because the diet is usually too restrictive . People deprive themselves of their favorite foods for too long and , let's be honest , eating is one of the best parts of being alive .

And ultimately these people , when their own diets , they run out of willpower . They end up going on like junk food benders at Pizza Hut , then beat themselves up for quitting eating more junk food because they feel so bad , and then you're away back at square one again . It's just a fact that we humans struggle with diet and nutrition big time .

I've seen it firsthand so much because for several years I had a side business as a personal trainer . I've always loved going to the gym . I've been a fitness fanatic since I was like 16 years old and , to be honest , that's probably one of the main things that just keeps me sane these days .

But when I was doing the PT stuff , I used to run an online 10 week program . So through that program I was able to work with people all over the world because it was online coaching . So we had people from like Germany , canada , the US , england , ages ranging from 25 up until women in their 60s , and they all did really well on it .

But one thing I noticed that used to keep cropping up time and again is , no matter what age they were or where they were from , whether they were man or a woman , 9 times out at the end , the biggest struggle was always maintaining the healthy diet , and the common denominator in all of this was that people were always complicating how they ate .

Maybe they'd been reading an article in Men's Health magazine telling them they need to eat X amount of protein for their own body weight , or maybe women were trying to calculate the right ratio of macros for each individual meal . Or maybe they were just drastically cutting their calories too much , which obviously makes things really hard to maintain .

When you're complicating diet that much , you're essentially just putting hurdles in your own way , and when you're completely depriving yourself of your favourite foods all the time , it actually creates this inner resistance . None of it becomes fun anymore , and there's only a certain amount of time that will power last for .

But the main point is to underline how we humans , who often struggle with diet and nutrition , can find solutions when we simplify things , and that's exactly what I've done with my own approach to nutrition and managing this sense of belly that I've got .

Just like most people listening to this right now , I'm one of those unfortunate humans who have what I call a sensitive belly . It's why I ended up being diagnosed with IBS and later ulcerative colitis .

Fortunately , I've managed to reverse both of those conditions , as I've explained in previous episodes and in my books , but I do still have to take more steps than the average person to look after this sensitive gut .

I've tried and tested many , many different things over the years , but there are four key approaches that I'm about to cover right now that have worked extremely well . And , best of all , these lifestyle changes and nutritional approaches are simple , they're easy to maintain and I'm pretty confident that they'll be effective for any manner of women with gut issues .

Who implements them ? So , number one , step one get in the basic right of reducing inflammatory foods in your diet and then increasing healing foods . So when I was first diagnosed with IBS back in 2010 , I was given literally zero advice about nutrition from a doctor the foods I should avoid , what foods might make matters worse . I got none of that .

It was just basically a case of take these pills and eat what you want , but the overwhelming evidence is that the food and the drink we eat on a daily basis does have a massive impact on your health . Food can literally hurt you and also heal you .

I've said this numerous times on the podcast before , but I just think it's completely insane that our Western medical healthcare system just essentially ignores nutrition . It focuses mainly on the sickness , the disease and then the types of drugs to deal with those symptoms . It never really gets to the root causes of what's causing those symptoms in the first place .

And yet there are so many healing foods , herbs and supplements out there that really can help us get well again or at least put our condition into remission . When you're dealing with gut health issues like IBS and also ulcerative colitis . You're in a situation where your digestive tract is overrun with bacteria , pathogens , viruses .

It creates this unhealthy and flamed environment where we've also got undigested , rotting food and then the whole gut microbiome goes completely out of whack . It's when we have this chronic inflammatory situation within our intestines that this eventually leads to disease and you getting the diagnosis further down the line .

So obviously it makes total sense to do what we can to reduce inflammation in the body and in the intestines .

But what are some of those key inflammatory foods that can really make the situation worse for you ? Well , unfortunately for us , they have been staples of our diet for generations . So number one foods containing gluten . So that's your breads , your rolls , pastas , pastries , all of these kind of things .

Then you've also got dairy and of course that means milk , cheese , yogurts . Those types of foods are also very inflammatory to the body as well . And then the next problem category for us is basically highly processed foods .

High sugar foods , microwave meals , takeaway meals all of this stuff that is not cooked fresh , all of this stuff that's high in sugar , high in trans fats , has been stripped of its nutrients and these ultimately spark inflammation in the body . And then another category is actually drinks . I'm talking about fizzy drinks .

So your Coca Cola , iron brew , lemonade , all of these kind of things even if it's diet or zero varieties of those drinks , they're still bad news for your health because they contain artificial sweeteners and all sorts of other unhealthy additives . Essentially , what they do is they rob your body of minerals and they mess up your gut microbiome .

That's four key food and drink groups that I avoid or reduce as much as possible in my diet . But listen , don't get me wrong . I don't completely ban them . I just limit my consumption of these types of foods as much as I can . I'm going to talk more about that later , towards the end of the episode .

But when I do limit these foods , my gut is more settled . There's less bloating . There's less heartburn . I don't have the usual symptoms that I had in the beginning , when I was first diagnosed . Now , if you're thinking , how the hell can I give up bread rolls , milk these are things that I have every single day .

It's actually a lot less complicated than you think . So , firstly , just about every supermarket on the planet these days has a free from section , so that's where you can buy gluten free bread , gluten free rolls , pasta , some other kind of common foods that you might eat which do contain gluten . You can avoid them by going to the free from section .

And , by the way , gluten is a type of protein that's found in wheat and there's grown evidence that it's linked to the development of various diseases , but basically the bottom line is that it's not good for your gut . So then on to dairy and milk .

A dairy intolerance is one of the most common food sensitivities , among both children and adults , which triggers all sorts of symptoms . And then there's lactose intolerance , which is a reaction to a specific sugar in milk which causes digestive issues . And that's even more common because apparently that affects like three quarters of adults all over the world .

But what people don't also realize as well is that hormones are routinely pumped into cows to increase the milk production and then also deal with any like reproductive issues as well on the farm . And then you've got antibiotics . You'll sometimes get a vet giving a cow antibiotics to prevent disease , to ensure the cows in a fit condition to produce plenty of milk .

So we've got these added hormones . Sometimes there's steroids , antibiotics . All of this then naturally makes its way into the cows milk which we're then consuming . Now you've got health authorities claiming that these don't affect human health , but there's a growing number of scientists and health experts that argue otherwise . And the Quitting Milk ?

That was one of the first steps I ever took on my gut healing journey . I remember I got a food intolerance test done back then and it came back with these inflammatory markers and the number one food source that was causing me the problems was milk . Now I'll be honest , I don't actually know how legit that food intolerance test actually was .

It was so many years ago now and there are different opinions on the effectiveness and the results of these intolerance tests . But whenever I drank milk again , I have noticed that my gut doesn't react well to it . So that's a sign in itself that it was a smart move for me to cut out milk .

And I actually found a few studies which concluded that an increased consumption of dairy products not only contributes to digestive issues but it's also linked to heart disease and even prostate cancer . And I've been following this doctor for many years now . His name's Dr Mark Hyman . He's a highly respected doctor in the US .

He's written several New York Times top selling books . He has next level knowledge on nutrition , on cleansing the body , and he's got a very specific opinion on consuming dairy and he said based on the research and my experience practicing medicine , I typically advise most of my patients to avoid dairy products completely .

I like ice cream just as much as the next person , but as a scientist , I have to look honestly at what we know . I came across comments from a health expert called Walter Willett . He's the second most cited scientist in all of clinical medicine and he's head of nutrition at Harvard University School of Public Health .

So here's what Mr Willett said the fact that the majority of the world's population actually can't drink milk as adults because they're lactose intolerant should say to us that milk is really not an essential part of the human diet . It's really an unusual part of the human diet .

Now let me quickly say that raw milk is an exception and that's actually considered to be a superfood by many alternative health experts , and it's something that I've actually had no problems with in the past . But raw milk is a whole other podcast episode on its own , so I'll definitely talk about that another time .

But my main point here is that it's a wise move to vastly reduce your use of pasteurized milk . A splash or two of it in a cup of tea obviously isn't going to cause you many problems .

But if you're drinking a fair amount of it every week , along with having like quite a lot of cheese regularly or maybe some other dairy products , then all of this is going to add up and it will add to the inflammation in your body and therefore it will worsen your gut issues .

So for me , these days I just buy a good quality oat milk , and I really like this stuff . I can have it in my smoothies and I also have it with my porridge , and to me it tastes just as good . And there are various other nut milks as well that you can buy , like almond milk or hazelnut milk , and coconut milk is also a really good option .

But then I also minimize highly processed meals and fizzy drinks . So this isn't rocket science . It's basically just a case of cooking and preparing more fresh meals . Don't be relying on the pre-packaged stuff that's everywhere in supermarkets or putting ready made meals that are good to go after three minutes in the microwave .

All of that garbage is just stripped of all nutrients and it's not doing your body any good . So for me , for example , maybe mid-morning I'll start the day with a healthy smoothie . I'll throw in some frozen fruits , oats , oatmeal , some plant-based protein powder and a little cinnamon .

Whiz all of that up and then you've got a really healthy , quick meal that's full of nutrients . And then maybe in the evening We'll cook something like with chicken and a seasoning with the chicken , some Roasted potatoes and some veg on the side can mix things up with that .

That's obviously really tasty and again , it's a home-cooked meal which is far more nutritious . And then , when it comes to fizzy drinks , we just don't buy them . We just don't buy them in the house , and instead I simply drink more water , more Fresh orange juice or things like herbal teas .

And when it comes into adding even more healing foods in place of those inflammatory foods , we're just talking about more fruits and vegetables . We all know we're supposed to eat like five portions of fruit and veg a day , but let's be honest , who actually does that ? Who , when they really think about it , does that every day of the week ?

But we really should put more focus on trying to get more of those foods in foods like bananas , papaya , lemon they're all great for the digestive system . And then , when you add an apple , strawberries , grapes there's so many amazing tasty fruits out there which are a really , really tasty snack and can keep you away from the junk food .

Okay , that's us done with reducing the inflammatory foods and replacing them with healthier , healing foods . Now let's focus on strategy or nutritional protocol number two , and that's to start the day with cleansing .

So when you're dealing with IBS or ulcerative colitis , it can get to the point where you struggle to digest so many foods that your diet crinks and frinks , to the point where things just become really restricted . But it took me a long time to realize that it's not just all about the foods themselves .

We really need to focus on the internal environment that the foods are going into . My digestion was messed up because my digestive tract was a mess . I'm talking about being bagged up with bacteria , viruses , undigested food and the colon , my gut microbiome , then all being a complete mess as a result of all of that .

But when I really started to see big improvements in my digestive health was when I really started to focus on cleansing the internal environment , really just cleaning out the vessel every single day , just like we brush our teeth or we wash our hair , wash our face on a daily basis .

I honestly think we need to pay the same kind of attention to our inner environment , especially these days when our diet is filled with so many additives , chemicals , and then we've got things like toxic heavy metals in our food , in our water .

So for me that means starting every day with a cleansing process , cleaning out the digestive tract before any food passes my lips . And the best part about this is that it's so simple to do .

I just drink a pint of filtered water with the juice of half a lemon , and then I also add in a quarter teaspoon of pink Himalayan salt and the salt then provides added minerals to the drink . So I drink a pint of this lemon water every single day at the start of the day , with no excuses , because it's so simple to do and it actually tastes amazing .

And the reason it's so good for the gut is that lemons have antibacterial and antiviral properties . So when you've got all those bugs in your digestive tract , they're causing chaos . They're causing the inflammation You've got the undigested food particles because you're not breaking down your food properly .

The lemon and the combination of the salts they have this flushing effect that clears out all of that crap and helps you get your digestion up to a good start every day . And the big bonus for me is that I really used to struggle with constipation badly . It was an absolute nightmare .

And when you drink this lemon water on a daily basis with the salt , it really keeps you regular and you get to the point where constipation just no longer is an issue .

But then , secondly , on top of that , taking things to the next level , I also drink a pint of fresh celery juice , and I do that maybe like 30 to 60 minutes after finishing the lemon water . Now , when I first came across the amazing gut healing benefits of celery juice , I drank the stuff for like a year non-stop , day after day .

But these days , having got all those benefits and really cleared out my digestive tract , I drink the celery juice maybe three or four days a week now just to really maintain that gut health . And celery juice is extremely healing for the gut . If you've listened to any of my previous episodes , I'm sure you'll hear me banging on about it many times before .

And that's because , as well as being high in minerals like potassium and sodium , it also kills viruses and pathogens in the gut , including the main troublemakers , which are strep bacteria , epstein-barr virus and also the shingles virus , which is now being identified as a root cause of ulcerative colitis .

If you want to learn more about that , then check out episode 24 on this podcast , where I spoke to Gut Health Coat Anya Gakowska . She explains a lot more about that in that episode . But another couple of benefits of drinking celery juice as well as that flushes toxins out of the liver and it also helps raise hydrochloric acid levels in the stomach .

Hydrochloric acid helps break down proteins and fats in the gut . So , ultimately , no need for laxatives , no need for colonics .

Nutrition can do the job for you and , trust me , if you're currently fat and , like crazy , you're dealing with constant constipation or just feeling bloated all the time , then these are all warning signs from the body that you really do need to cleanse that internal environment .

Okay , let's move on to lifestyle change and nutritional protocol number three , and that's using supplements to deal with nutritional deficiencies . One of the first major lessons I learned when I went down that alternative health route to try and figure out all of my own problems was that gut disorders and nutritional deficiencies they go hand in hand .

Obviously , the standard processed diet that most people eat these days doesn't contain many vitamins or minerals at all , but it's worth pointing out that even if you did eat a super clean , super organic diet .

There's a fair chance that you're still going to be not covering all bases when it comes to vitamins and minerals , and this is something that myself and Heidi Moretti discussed in episode number 20 . Want to believe Heidi's a dietitian and author of the amazing book Gut Fix , because what Heidi had to say about nutritional deficiencies then .

Like , say , chemical fertilizers will speed up the growth of just about any plants , but it does not mean these plants are getting the nutrition that they used to . You can eat all the spinach in the world , but if the soil was not magnesium rich , you will not get magnesium .

So I think that's in a natural why you cannot get enough nutrients through your diet alone . It doesn't mean don't try to , but it means you still have to think about what you're missing , even when you're eating well .

Zinc , which is also very important for your immune system and also for men's testosterone levels , and another supplement which is covering all bases is a good quality multivitamin and mineral capsule . Okay , let's move on to nutritional approach . Number four and that's just not being perfect .

So this might be a wee bit unexpected at the end here , but I felt it was really important to include this one .

People mistakenly believe that , because I'm a health and wellness journalist , I'm big into fitness and I host this gut health podcast , that I'm some sort of super clean eating saint , that I hardly ever eat any junk food , and I've got to be honest . That's just not the case . Lasagna is my favorite food .

I love the stuff and technically I really shouldn't be in lasagna because it's packed with gluten and dairy not exactly good for my gut . And then at the weekends I love a Chinese takeaway on a Saturday night chicken , satay , fried rice , prawn crackers those manmade trans fats are in there , also not good for the body . But here's the important point .

I only those foods sparingly . I'd never go nuts with them . I always have a limited amount of those kinds of foods , and it goes back to this whole simplification thing that I was talking about at the beginning of the episode . The way I approach things is that I simply eat as clean as possible Monday to Friday .

So that's cutting out the gluten , cutting out the dairy foods , cutting out the high-processed , high-sugar junk foods and not having any of the fizzy drinks . Monday to Friday I hardly touch any of that stuff . And then at the weekend I just relax my diet a little bit . I don't beat myself up for having a treat .

I don't deprive myself of all of those favorite foods I used to love before all of my digestive problems started . And here's the thing because I'm doing the cleansing , because I've put the work in for a good while beforehand and because I'm eating clean Monday to Friday , I can actually get away with those things . You have that bit of give .

When you treat the body right for the majority of the time , you do get a wee bit of leeway , but then , at the same time , if I go a wee bit too long , the body starts letting me know .

If I maybe kick the arse out of it a wee bit with the junk food at the weekend , then eat more than I really should , I'll start getting heartburn , I'll start feeling bloated , I'll start feeling really tired and fatigued , and those are all just warning signs like hey , mark , you need to rain it in a wee bit . And then I know what I need to do .

Once Monday comes around , I get right back on it again the lemon water , the celery juice and just get back on to eating the way I know that works Now . Of course , not everybody is the same and I'm obviously at a really good place now where I've done a lot of work to clean out the body , a lot of detox work .

I've made lots of wholesale lifestyle changes .

If you're in a position right now where you're really struggling with colitis symptoms , you're really struggling with your IBS , it might be the case that you can only get away with a wee bit of the treats at the weekend , maybe just one day not going too well with it all , and you maybe need to spend a bit more time on the detoxing and the cleansing , and

that's totally fine . It's really important that you listen to your body and realize that these symptoms are telling you to really pay a bit more closer attention to what you're eating .

But the main point here is that if you do follow these main steps that I've mentioned in this gut healing nutritional approach , then I'm confident that longer term you're going to make good progress in improving your gut health . These steps will absolutely move you in the right direction . So here they are again .

Step number one cut out or reduce as much as possible Gluten , dairy , highly processed , high sugar , junk foods and fizzy drinks and instead load up on lots of fruits and vegetables . Step number two focus not just on the foods but on cleansing your internal environment .

By cleansing with fresh lemon water at the start of every day and drinking fresh , serratious , you're really going to support your digestive system massively . And then the third step again was to address nutritional deficiencies . Take some of those key supplements that I mentioned .

They're really going to help your body address the deficiencies and they'll give you the best chance of overcoming some of those symptoms you've been dealing with for a long time . And then that last step again was not to stress over being perfect with your diet . Remember that strict diets never work . And remember , give it time .

Your gut issues didn't appear overnight . They're not going to reverse overnight either . It takes time , it takes patience and it takes consistency , doing the right things over and over until you gradually see better results . Okay , that wraps things up , guys , but just a reminder . I've produced a new ebook which covers all of this stuff in more detail .

It's called Gut Rescue and you can download it via my website , wwwforgutsakeorg , and I've also included the direct link in the podcast show notes below this episode . And if you know anyone else with IBS or ulcerative colitis , then share the link with them as well . Share the love . Okay , thanks for listening , guys . Catch you in the next episode .